Last night on Fox News, Geraldo Rivera took a hit out on David Earls, a convicted child-rapist whose atrociously low sentence Bill O'Reilly has been demagoguing.

Earls is a bad man. He raped a little girl and got a ridiculous one-year sentence. But it's still astonishing that last night two grown men openly discussed on national television whether or not it's OK to just up and kill him.

O'Reilly, cognizant of the criticism he received for his role in turning George Tiller into a national villain who was then gunned down by an abortion opponent, managed to struggle through the moral logic of Thou Shalt Not Kill. But Rivera, with a wink and a nod, basically said "Yes." The only reservation he has about someone taking his advice to go out and kill Earls is that they might get hurt themselves.

Here's the gist of the exchange:

O'Reilly: If Earls ever walks out of jail and gets killed, who are they going to blame?

Rivera: ... I can only tell you ladies and gentlemen, that I will not weep if something happens to David Earls. I do not encourage vigilantism. I think it is something that puts your own life at risk. I do not advise it, I do not counsel it. I will not, however, weep if David Earls is found sometime on a country road.

O'Reilly: We obviously don't want anyone to do anything. That would be as morally wrong as what Earls did—to take Earls' life. You can't do that.

Rivera: I don't agree quite with your moral reasoning. You're more moral than I am.